The Earl's Entanglement (Border Series Book 5)(19)

“I’d speak to you before we dine,” he said.

Stepping back to allow him entry, Garrick poured two goblets of wine from the service set that had been left on a small oak table near his bed.

“Your steward is to be commended,” he said. Though the man couldn’t have had much warning of their arrival, a fire had been roaring in the hearth of the sparse but well-appointed room in anticipation of his arrival. Rosewater and wine had been left out for him to cleanse with. Common in the Holy Land, it was less so here.

“My condolences for your loss,” Garrick said.

“And to you for yours.”

They drank a toast to their departed fathers, and Garrick was reminded of the condolences he’d exchanged with Lady Sara at Kenshire. Though her father had been old and ill, surely it had not made her loss any less painful.

So much death and more to come, at least here in the borderlands.

“He fought hard, and fought well. Our clan mourns him still, but he left this world fighting for what he believed in,” Graeme said. “Peace. An established border. His clan’s survival.”

Garrick remained silent. He couldn’t say his own father had done the same. They’d fought for Edward’s cause, not their own. Though he’d be named a traitor if he shared such thoughts aloud.

“You wanted to speak to me.”

“Your charge . . .”

Emma.

“How did you come to escort her here, without a chaperone?”

He and Graeme had spoken of women in the past. They’d even made jests about who would be bound by marriage first. But this was different. This was Emma.

“I stopped at Kenshire to offer condolences to Lady Sara, and it seemed her sister-in-law needed an escort to Dunmure.”

“To Alex Kerr?”

“To his wife.”

“I see.”

“Her lady’s maid was unable to ride after our first day of travel. She’s behind us still, and if you can receive her, she’ll likely arrive in just a few days.”

“Hmm . . .”

He knew what was coming next. But that didn’t make it any easier to hear.

“Is Lady Emma spoken for?”

The hand at his side tightened.

“You will have to ask the lady herself.”

Whether it was his tone or his expression, Garrick wasn’t sure, but Graeme immediately picked up on the feelings Garrick had been trying to deny for days.

“Is she spoken for by you?”

Yes!

Beyond Graeme’s predilection toward the company of fine women, which was much like his own, there was nothing that would not recommend him to Emma, something that filled Garrick with an uncomfortable feeling of jealousy. And yet he could not lie.

“Nay, she is not. I travel to Linkirk to secure my own betrothal.”

Graeme’s eyes widened. “Your own?”

He ground his teeth, wanting the conversation to end. Quickly. “Aye.”

“Your mother.” Graeme knew the situation well.

“She has arranged it, aye. The Earl of Magnus’s daughter.”

Graeme whistled, and it took every ounce of fortitude Garrick possessed not to roll his eyes.

“Do you think such a match necessary?”

Garrick shook his head. “Nay, but my mother believes so. Inverglen had become difficult to control in my absence.”

His uncle, the Baron of Inverglen, hated Garrick for the same reason he’d hated his father. They were both English.

“Foolish bastard. The title was never his. Could never be his.”

There was one way. “Without my mother. Without me?”

Graeme narrowed his eyes. “Do you think he means to—”

“Nay. If I thought he’d risk my mother, do you think she’d be alone in Scotland?”

“Garrick, by God, if that man so much as gives your mother an untoward look . . .”

This was what he’d liked about the Scottish chief from their very first meeting. He took his sworn loyalty as seriously as any man. It mattered not to Graeme de Sowlis that an Englishman had inherited the title of Earl of Linkirk. An ally in the true sense of the word, the man would no doubt go to war on his behalf. Which, luckily, his betrothal to Magnus’s daughter would avoid.

“To alliances,” Garrick said, holding up his cup.

“New,” Graeme said. “And old.”

That was exactly what worried him.



Emma attempted to slow her pace as she barreled down the corridor in Graeme de Sowlis’s home. For as long as she could remember, she’d been told that she walked too fast, spoke too fast, though none of it was said with malice. Her brothers merely liked to tease her; Emma’s parents, God rest their souls, had hoped to school her; and Aunt Lettie and Uncle Simon, well, they’d long ago given up on changing her ways. They’d said so in the kindest way possible, of course. She loved her family, and was eternally grateful to have their love in return.

But none of them quite understood her.

Emma wanted to live. Every moment. Every day. Each night she lay in her bed and imagined how she could eke out a bit more joy the next day—for one thing her parents’ early death had taught her was that there may not be a next day. Before she’d gone to the market on that fateful day, her mother had kissed her cheek and said, “Until later, my love.”